Bosses at the BBC are trying to stem the rancour within Corporation ranks by telling staff to stop publicising its 'problems' on Twitter.

Acting director of news Fran Unsworth sent an internal email yesterday saying: 'It would be helpful if some of our problems were not played out publicly across social media and in the pages of the national press.'

Her plea emerged as Prime Minister David Cameron weighed into the row over the £450,000 pay-off for departed director general George Entwistle saying it was 'hard to justify'.

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Temporary? A raft of changes brought in overnight means that the key positions held in the BBC news chain are all held by acting managers, raising fears that tough decisions can't be made

Miss Unsworth's appeal is an attempt
to regain some control over an increasingly chaotic Corporation. She
said staff should all be 'pulling together' to restore trust in its news
output.

Some of the BBC's biggest names such
as Jeremy Paxman, Jonathan Dimbleby and John Simpson have gone public
with their opinions, some highly critical.

Others, like Radio 5 Live presenter Victoria Derbyshire, have vented their views on Twitter.

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It has emerged that BBC Trust
vice-chairman Diane Coyle agreed Mr Entwistle's pay-out during a phone
call with Lord Patten during her Saturday night viewing of Strictly Come
Dancing.

The trust said Miss Coyle had spoken to him then returned to watching the show afterwards.

Miss Unsworth referred to the 'tumultuous and very sad events of the past few days'. She said: 'We need a collective and collegiate sense of all pulling together to restore trust in the BBC’s news output.'

George Entwistle quit and other
senior staff stood aside because Newsnight dropped a probe exposing
Jimmy Savile as a child abuser and then a 'shoddy' report wrongly
accused Lord McAlpine of being a paedophile.

Stability: Lorraine Heggesey, the first woman to control BBC One says that there is an acting person in almost every key BBC position

Since the resignation of Mr Entwistle
on Saturday, some of the BBC's more high-profile staff have taken to
social networking site Twitter and the internet to voice their opinions
on the crisis engulfing the corporation.

Victoria Derbyshire, the Radio 5 Live presenter, said Mr Entwistle had 'finally' resigned.

And Norman Smith, the BBC's chief
political correspondent, tweeted that Helen Boaden, who was said by the
BBC to have 'stepped aside' from her job, while an internal inquiry is
being carried out, would not go 'without a fight' if the BBC tried to
sack her.

Yesterday Robert Peston, the BBC's
business editor, used his blog to dispute the BBC's claim that Miss
Boaden had been happy to 'step aside' from her role and said she had
hired lawyers, along with her deputy Stephen Mitchell, to inform Mr
Davie 'they are quite capable of running BBC news, even with the
uncertainty created by the.... inquiry'.

Ms Unsworth, and Ceri Thomas, the editor of the Radio 4 Today programme,
are filling in for the director of news Miss Boaden, 56, and Mr Mitchell.

Ms Unsworth stressed her appointment
'is a temporary one'. She said: 'This is a tough time for everyone in
the organisation - in particular for those of us in BBC News. And, of
course, for some individuals most of all. Both Helen and Steve are
outstanding leaders of BBC News whose experience and ability will be
much missed in the coming weeks.'

'Many of you have today shown a great
deal of support for them and they wanted me to let you know how grateful
they are for that.'

Karen O'Connor, a former deputy editor of Panorama and Newsnight, has been drafted in as acting editor of Newsnight.

But former controller of BBC One, Lorraine Heggessey, has said there is a
danger that the situation could lead to a lack of stability when it is needed most.

'We've got acting heads in almost every major division,' she said.

'The person in charge of television is acting, the person responsible
for radio is acting, the person responsible for news is acting and the
director general himself is acting and when you are acting it is
difficult to make difficult decisions that are going to have long-term
consequences so some stability is needed.

'People need to know who they are going to be reporting to, who their
boss is and have confidence that those bosses are capable of sorting
problems like this out.'

Acting BBC director-general Tim Davie says he has already 'got a full grip of the situation by clarifying exactly who's in charge', adding: 'The BBC deserves strong leadership and that is what I intend to bring.

'We have appointed a new editor of Newsnight to get a grip of the
situation and that's what we're really focused on, which is to put a
clear line of command into news so that we build the trust of the BBC.

Will he be next? Lord Patten, right, with George Entwistle as he announces his resignation on Saturday night

Out and in: Acting director general of the BBC
Tim Davie (right) arrives at New Broadcasting house in central London on
Monday morning, after George Entwistle's (left) dramatic resignation on
Saturday night

THE KEY REPLACEMENTS AT THE TOP OF THE BBC

Fran Unsworth, BBC newsgathering head since 2005, is temporarily taking over from Helen Boaden as the Corporation's news chief.

The
54-year-old started in BBC local radio before going to Radio 1’s
Newsbeat and later working for BBC Radio 4’s The World at One.

A former radio producer in Washington D.C. and a 25-year BBC veteran, she also worked as head of BBC political programming.

In
her job as head of newsgathering she is responsible for around 800
staff working in the UK and abroad, on a salary of £166,650.

The
Manchester University drama graduate, who has a flat in Marylebone,
west London, is from North Staffordshire and is president of the media
group Society of Editors

Ceri Thomas,
a former editor of Radio 5 Live's breakfast programme, took over from
Kevin Marsh as editor of Radio 4's flagship Today programme in 2006.

The 49-year-old started his broadcasting career in 1989 at LBC Radio and joined Today as a junior producer two years later.

He
was listed by MediaGuardian this year as the 70th most influential
person in the media and has previously been praised by Ms Boaden for his
'flair and passion for radio'.

The
newspaper praised Today for remaining 'required listening' but said Mr
Thomas was 'dogged by criticism that the show is too male'.Specifically,
identification was not confirmed by photograph with the first victim.
The second victim could not be traced in order to provide up-to-date
corroboration.'

'Separately, I need a bit of time. I've just got into the job. I'm going
to take a bit of time to look through the recommendations and then
we'll take the disciplinary process through and be fair to those
individuals.

'There may be disciplinary action but I want to be fair to
people. I don't subscribe to the view that you should act very quickly
in that regard and be unreasonable.

'The BBC has lost a director-general in this process. That in itself is very significant and he has taken responsibility.'

But he refused to comment on Entwistle's £450,000 pay-off, saying it is a matter for him and the BBC Trust.

Veterans like David Dimbleby and Johns Simpson have accused the BBC or being blighted by over-management with bosses who are 'bonkers' and speak 'gobbledygook'.

Last night, the official report into the botched Newsnight programme by
the BBC's Scotland director Ken MacQuarrie found there was confusion
about who had the ultimate responsibility for 'final editorial sign-off'
on the story which falsely linked Lord McAlpine to a paedophile ring.

In
the report, he said the programme's editorial management structure had
been 'seriously weakened' as a result of the editor having to step aside
over the Jimmy Savile scandal, and the departure of the deputy editor.
Mr MacQuarrie added that there were shortcomings in the quality of the
journalism.

He said: 'During the editorial decision-making process, some of the basic journalistic checks were not completed.

'Although legal advice was sought over the report, no
right of reply was offered to the unnamed individual at the centre of
the allegation.

The programme featured an interview with Steve
Messham, an abuse victim who said a senior political figure of the time
abused him. He later said he wrongly identified his abuser and
apologised.

London mayor Boris Johnson said there should be a 'wholesale massacre of everybody involved professionally speaking' but backed Lord Patten to keep his role.

He told ITV1's The Agenda with Tom Bradby there had been 'an absolutely catastrophic breakdown of journalistic standards" surrounding Newsnight that meant other heads should roll.

'First of all, they ignored the Savile scoop which they were sitting on, and it seems like they had quite a lot of evidence and then they had this crazy switching the steering wheel in the other direction and going for some 'top Tory paedo' without any real evidence.

'It was absolutely disastrous.'

The BBC Trust said Mr MacQuarrie's findings of 'serious failures' were 'very concerning'.

A spokeswoman said: 'It is clear from the MacQuarrie report on the November 2 Newsnight that there were serious failures in the normal checks and balances that the trust expects from BBC journalism, and these were compounded by the confusion created by the dual reporting structure in news established during the Pollard inquiry. This is very concerning.'

Meanwhile, a YouGov poll for The Sun found that 44 per cent of Britons trust the BBC's journalists, the first time the figure has dropped below 50 per cent.

BBC BOSS WITH HAND IN NEWSNIGHT SCANDAL TO BE PROBED

The BBC has said it intends to clarify the role played by the director of BBC Northern Ireland in the Newsnight fiasco.

Peter Johnston, who has been with BBC NI since 1994, had some involvement before the programme which wrongly implicated a peer in a child sex abuse scandal was broadcast.

The extent of his role has not yet been determined.

In a statement issued last night, a spokeswoman for the BBC in Belfast said: 'We can confirm that Peter Johnston was involved in decisions about the BBC Newsnight report on 2 November 2012.

'The sequencing of events around this report has been reviewed by Ken MacQuarrie and the BBC has now published a summary of findings and actions. The next stage of this process is now under way. It will, amongst other things, seek to clarify decision-making roles and responsibilities in relation to the Newsnight report.

'We expect that these investigations will be concluded as quickly as possible. In the meantime, we will not be making any further comment.'

The broadcast in which the peer was mistakenly identified led to the resignation of BBC director general George Entwistle on Saturday.

Mr Johnston is on the BBC’s management board at national level. The 46-year-old, from Ballymena, Co Antrim, has a background in marketing and is understood to be on a salary of about £150,000.

A report by the BBC’s Scotland director Ken MacQuarrie found that Newsnight failed to complete basic journalistic checks.

It also claimed there was confusion about who had the ultimate responsibility for 'final editorial sign-off' on the story.

Mr MacQuarrie concluded that Newsnight had been seriously weakened as a result of the editor having to step aside over the Jimmy Savile allegations and the departure of the deputy editor.